Oswald alone

"He's been baptized, sanctified, redeemed by the blood,
But his daily devotions are stuck in the mud ..."

-- Amy Grant, "Fat Baby" (Millikan/Robinson)

On May 4 of this year, President Bush spoke about his daily devotional reading:

Bush said he is reading Oswald Chambers, a Scottish-born devotional writer and author of "My Utmost for His Highest," who died in 1917. "If you've read Oswald Chambers, you'll understand that Oswald Chambers is a pretty good gauge to test your walk," he said.

This is the same devotional book that Bush spoke of during the 2000 campaign. The president must really like this book -- he's been reading it every day for more than three years.

I find that ... odd.

My Utmost isn't bad but, well, there's not much there there. He has some thoughtful things to say about loving God above all else, but even at his best Chambers is a kind of Bonhoeffer lite. And My Utmost does not include 365 cases of Chambers at his best. Its entries for many days are about as insightful and spiritually enriching as a newspaper horoscope.

Don't take my word for it -- you can read the president's favorite devotional online here or here.

The enduring popularity of the book is hard to explain. My guess is that it has more to do with the informal-but-forceful system of evangelical imprimatur. The book is regarded as acceptable and therefore is widely accepted.

I've read the book, but I've never managed to stick with Chambers' daily readings for an entire year. (Confession: I've never been good at the whole evangelical pseudo-discipline of "daily devotions." I suppose I'm more of a spiritual binge-drinker/bulimic.)

My Utmost's arbitrary and fragmentary choice of Scripture texts is frustrating and not always respectful of context. After reading a couple of months worth of such entries, one realizes that the actual texts matter little as Chambers quickly leaves them behind to offer some hortatory fortune cookie. These little pep talks start to blur together after a while and I start to think that maybe my time would be better spent with Thomas a Kempis or John Woolman.

Take for example today's reading, which is allegedly based on Matthew 5:3, "Blessed are the poor in spirit, [for theirs is the kingdom of heaven]." Chambers isn't working his way through the Beatitudes, mind you, he just decided that August 21 was a good day for this particular Beatitude. (He discusses all of them, sort of, on July 25, and deals with another on March 26. This ad hoc approach may arise from his wife's literal cutting and pasting when she assembled this book from his writings 10 years after his death.)

The mini-homily Chambers spins out of this text includes statements like these:

"The true character of the loveliness that speaks for God is always unnoticed by the one possessing that quality."

"We always know when Jesus is at work because He produces in the commonplace something that is inspiring."

Well, OK. I guess. If you work hard enough to make sense of today's reading, you might decide that Chambers is approaching the idea that poverty of the spirit is something like the "being present" that Annie Dillard described as "Living like weasels." Or maybe not.

Passages like this may explain why we never hear Bush quoting or referring to something he read in Chambers' book. Chambers isn't exactly quotable. And even when he's basically recycling platitudes and proverbs, he tends to do so in a way that takes all the oomph out of them.

And but so anyway my question here is how is it possible that George W. Bush has been reading this book every day for three years? Three years! I understand that he likes the book, but shouldn't it have inspired him, by now, to move on to something with a little more "meat."

It's possible, of course, that Bush does not actually read this book every day. It's possible that some shrewd adviser told him, back in 2000, that talking about Oswald Chambers was a good and safe answer to questions about his personal spirituality and that years later he is still offering this same answer without thinking there's anything strange about that.

But let's stick to the more charitable view and take Bush at his word.

"I have fed you with milk, and not with meat," St. Paul told the Christians at Corinth. Chambers, to his credit, would I think have said the same thing to readers of My Utmost for His Highest.

"I gave you milk, not solid food," Paul wrote, "for you were not yet ready for it. Indeed, you are still not ready."

Milk is fine, and so is the spiritual enfamil of My Utmost, but one is supposed to grow from this -- to move on to solid food and meat. Indeed, if one is really getting nourished, one must move on. As Calvin wrote, "If they never grow up so as to be able to bear at least some gentle food, it is certain that they have never been reared on milk."

I think Chambers would likely have been horrified at the prospect of a reader settling in and giving such preeminence to My Utmost for three years in a row. Consider this anecdote, related by J.I. Packer:

Chambers' word to a man who read only the Bible and books about it, and who felt stuck and inarticulate, was: "The trouble is you have allowed part of your brain to stagnate for want of use." The man later wrote, "There and then, [Chambers] gave me a list of over 50 books, philosophical, psychological, theological, covering almost every phase of modern thought," leading to "a revolution which can only be described as a mental new birth" -- just as Chambers had hoped.

If that story is true then Chambers would likely join me in encouraging Bush to move along to some new devotional literature.

One might also consider that the past several years haven't gone so well for George W. Bush. He's gotten his country entangled in a deadly, monumentally costly and possibly insoluble quagmire in Iraq. And domestically he's bankrupted the national treasury while becoming the first president since Herbert Hoover to oversee a net loss of jobs.

A change might be a good thing.

So let me suggest some new devotional reading for the president.

We know Bush is a big fan of books that are fragmented into daily "readings." John Baillie's A Diary of Private Prayer is a profound, challenging and beautiful example of such a book. It may, however, be too much in keeping with Bush's dad's Episcopalian tastes for the current president's liking.

Charles Haddon Spurgeon is unassailably evangelical and a compassionate conservative to boot. His book Morning and Evening is organized in much the same way as Chambers, but it's got more kick to it. Bush might find plenty in Spurgeon that would "test his walk," but I think he'd also find the book a source of encouragement.

And that may be important, since I'm hoping that Bush is going to find himself rather discouraged on November 2 and thereafter.

At least, that's what I'm praying for during my sort-of-daily devotions.

Comments

[Stephen]

I know people will get me for this, but. . .

I find it incredibly hard to believe that Bush reads the Bible - ever.

My lifetime spent going to church among evangelicals, school with them, pastoring among them, living my life as an evangelical, has taught me that people who actually read the Bible - the whole Bible - are quite different than those who merely pay attention to a few proof-texts and who read milky books like Chambers. (I also doubt that Bush has even seen a copy of My Utmost.)

Bush doesn't worship with the Body of Christ. His scriptural references are completely out of context of what the Bible says. That he is viewed by millions as a 'born-again man of God' is perhaps the greatest indictment upon the state of Evangelical Christianity that can be imagined.

[Nell Lancaster]

I'm gratified to hear Stephen reinforce from another perspective my own sense, based on a lifetime spent in political work, that Bush does not actually worship God.

As in so many other cases, he doesn't even work hard enough at it to be a very convincing pretender. Another instance of emperor's clothes, lack of.

[Nell L.]

But how I enjoy the result's of Fred's taking him at his word...

[Shocke]

Has anyone else ever found that Amy Grant song extremely creepy? There's a line that goes "He's got the biggest King James you've ever seen!" Kinda freaks me out.

[David]

I picked up Utmost during my first year at Bible school. During that year I suffered a near-nervous breakdown and total breakdown of my faith and I read while trying desparately to cling to the few tattered shreds remainng.
It helped little in trying to find something of substance in the shards of evangelicalism.

I picked it up again in the summer of '95 when I began to reach a place of returning to faith. I appreciated it immensely at that time, though I should note that I was also reading a large amount of Madeleine L'Engle which perhaps cast it's light on how I read Chambers.

The years following, also dark, Chambers was a source of some encouragement to me.

I haven't read it in several years now, though my memories of it are good. I can't say I have any desire to return to it, however, with the wealth of other reading now at my disposal.

I would agree that on it's own, it is not terribly substantive, and prone to interpretation various ways. This makes sense given that it is, as noted, pieced together from various bits of his writing after his death. I would imagine reading his sermons uncut and whole would much better represent Chambers' ideas and thoughts. From the sounds of the story told about his book reccomendations there was a good deal more to the man than is represented.

[Stephen]

David, your comments are appreciated. It sounds as if your painful journey is bringing you to good places; that helps me as I walk along my own dark path.

You have also brought up the fact, which I think Fred also alluded to, that at different times in people's spiritual lives, different things are appropriate. I once benefitted greatly from Max Lucado; I now have no use for him at all. I can still be grateful that he wrote what he did while coming to a place in my life where, quite honestly, I have moved beyond what he has to offer.

The point is not that we should never allow these types of milky things to be consumed, but that we should hold our brothers and sisters - up to and including the born-again President if necessary - accountable for actually growing past them.

Right now, my 2-year-old daughter's understanding of Jonah is that he ran from God, got swallowed by a fish, prayed for 3 days, got spit up and then he did the right thing. That's ok for her age. God have mercy on me and my wife if that's still her perspective when she's an adult.

[visitor]

There is something we can learn from your daughter, though. Matthew 18:1-4

[Visitor]

Note to Fred Clark(previous post): - You need the spirit of God in you to even mildly understand Oswald Chambers - pray and ask for the free gift of the Holy Spirit! Yes if you ask you'll receive - The Spirit of God is as vital as oxygen is to life for any and every christian.

Pray for your leaders that is what you are called to do as christians(if you are one) - at least Bush is reading something to make him a better christian, it's one step at a time to better ourselves isn't it! - pray for him to make the right choices for this country instead of criticizing him - God bless you all!

[Don Banks]

I related well to both those who evaluate Chambers as milky, and others who find him illuminiating.. Ive been in both camps, but now firmly in "Chambers", but don't focus on my poor termimnology. I have also encountered an extremist element from the milky camp who place supreme importance on doctrine formulated from microscopic examination of the Bible, resulting in an emphasis on the merits of holiness through self control and mind control via substitute mantra chanting or brain washing (read verse memorisation etc). These people, and I was one of them, if asked how do you know you're saved and going to heaven immediately respond with a checklist of bible verses, you know,tick the box if you have believed this and done that. "Making a decision for Christ" or "asking Him into your heart" (both terms not ever used by Jesus I note) would earn you 50 points, whereas the necessity of water baptism, might score you 20 (the thief on the cross couldn't get leave of absence). If you score enough points- bingo! there's your assurance. For me , nearly 10 years now of reading a lot of Chambers work, has been absolutely illuminating. Now my response to the "assurance"question would be simply "is 2 Corinthians 1 v 21 & 22 your living experience?"
that is, if we have received the Holy Spirit, there is no more that needs to be said in terms of our eternal destiny and our newly acquired innate "ability" to reproduce the holiness of God and the behaviour and disposition of Jesus in this life. There is a lot of obedience to follow but not ability. Understanding of doctrine simply enables us to appreciate more what God has actually done for us, but we can only understand it on the correct level and respond with the appropriate level of devotion and love when we have received His Spirit from Him. The objection from Bible hardliners (and Ive been one)stems from an uncomfortable feeling they have about such statements as mine, as they reek of gnostic hocus pocus. But in reality, they are a bit worried because it has not been their personal experience, making them feel spiritually insecure and it is very comforting to have an pat answer for everything from the Book, although would that be the Catholic Book or the shorter Protestant version?
The reason Chambers places a lot of emphasis on the first Beatitude is because contained in its simple statement is the key to everything, and Oswald and I, after a lot of seeking, have found it.